Covid second wave more acute
The country went through the first wave of Covid-19 in June-July last year. The second wave began this March and seems to be more acute.
At the beginning of the second wave, the rate of daily infection stands higher than that of first wave. The country is seeing a drastic rise in transmission of the virus and deaths every day.
According to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), transmissions peaked in 10 days from 25 June to 4 July last year. At that time, 3701 people were infected by Covid-19 on a daily basis while the average number of deaths was 41.
The number of patients detected daily has been increasing in the country since 10 March. Records show, 4407 people are infected daily on average in the last 10 days from 23 March till yesterday (Thursday) while the average number of deaths stood at 39.
However, in the last seven days, the average number of Covid deaths stood at 44.
DGHS said on Thursday that there were 6,469 cases detected in 24 hours--the highest detection recorded in a single day. At that time 59 people breathed their last in different hospitals, which was the highest in the last 9 months.
The detection rate against tests was 22.94 per cent in last 24 hours. The last time that the country saw such rising trend of detection was on 9 August last year.
Public health experts say the second wave in the country has been worsening. Despite the drastic rise in cases, people are still reluctant to follow health guidelines.
The government has issued directives to contain the spread of the virus, but more stringent instructions are needed in the situation. Initiative should be taken to involve the people in enforcing the directives.
Abu Jamil Faisel, a member of the public health advisory committee of the DGHS, told Prothom Alo that although many ministries are involved in the instructions given to control the infection, certain ministries are still 'asleep' while others are still thinking of what to do.
He said each ministry has to prepare its own implementation plan within a day or two. These plans need to be implemented in a coordinated manner.
Bangladesh detected its first coronavirus patient on 8 March last year. From June to August, the rate of corona infection peaked. There was a slight increase in November and December but the rest of the period the infection was downward.
The rising trend of last year’s June-July has appeared once again in the country’s daily detection rate for the last five weeks.
According to DGHS data, 21,629 people were infected with coronavirus in January this year while the number was 11,077 in February.
Two months later, since 10 March, the rate of daily detection has been increasing. Totaled 65,079 people were infected in March which is twice as many cases than the first two months of the year.
The rate of infection began to increase from mid-May last year. By the third week of August, the detection rate was over 20 per cent. From then the detection rate started to decrease. From the beginning to the end of February this year, the detection rate fell below 3 per cent.
There are some determinants set by World Health Organisation (WHO) to measure whether the infection is under control in a country. One of them is the rate of detection. If the detection rate remains below 5 per cent for more than two consecutive weeks, then the situation is considered to be under control.
Three months later, the detection rate stood over 10 per cent on 18 March. A total of 24,198 samples were collected in the last 24 hours. Among them, the rate of detection was 22.94 per cent.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, WHO has been saying coronavirus patients must be detected as well asthose who come in contact with them. Public health experts have been advocating collection of at least 20,000 samples daily in the country for a long time.
For the first time in the country, on 16 March, more than 20,000 samples were collected. Last March, a total of 626,549 people were tested, which is the highest in one month since the beginning of Covid-19 pandemic.
The number of patients undergoing treatment in the country was declining since the percentage of recovered patients increased more than the detection rate for several months.
But since March, the number of infected patients has begun to rise again. Now, there are 63,721 corona infected patients in the country undergoing treatment in hospitals. At the beginning of March, the number was 39,646.
According to the DGHS, there were 617,764 Covid cases as of Thursday. Of them, 544,938 people recovered from this highly infectious disease while the number of deaths stands at 9105.